Help! Federal black box recovery impossible

Zapstone

Z
I am in ceos, I get a rank up mission telling me to go to sothis and recover a black box. I go to sothis and scan the beacon, I am directed to planet D1. en route I get a mission.... update? more of an offer with an X and a check mark. it asks me to go back to the beacon and scan again with a higher payout. I decline because I am NOT flying back 100kls to scan the beacon again. ive been in orbit of Sothis D1 for AGES now and N O T H I N G. No updates other than anouther 'redirect' offer. No signal sources. Only suffering.

Please help...
 

Crank Larson

Crank Larson
Don't decline the redirect - you can't complete the mission unless you can actually find the black boxes!

Though... Don't confuse redirections with extra missions. You do also get offered extra missions in your inbox that you can ignore.

For black box missions, just go to the target body and orbit it for a while (at around 0.1Ls should do it). You should get the mission target within a few minutes. If you don't, then drop down into normal space and back into supercruise a couple of times. If that doesn't trigger anything after a few minutes, I usually then leave the system and come back (though I haven't had to do that for a long time).
 
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IndigoWyrd

IndigoWyrd
I've never once understood how this happens. I hear about it all the time, but I've never experienced it.

When I get the mission update that says "Fly to XYZ body" that's what I do, one orbital pass or less and there's my Mission Target. Every single time. No waiting, no nonsense, just lock on, drop in and do what I have to do.

And when that What I have to Do involves retrieving some bit of cargo, be it a Black Box, Rare Art, or any commodity, I always, always, always take collector limpets. Lock on, throttle to 30, hatch open and launch.

At leat 90% of the time I can pick up whatever I came for before any ships show up. The rest of the time, it's either a very short firefight and some bonus bounties, or my engine trails and a high-wake.
 

mbar

mbar
You accept the redirect. Jump to the next closest system and jump back to the mission system to scan the beacon to avoid the long SC back. Assuming you have the fuel.

The FDL is a PITA to scoop cargo.
 

Crank Larson

Crank Larson
I did several black box missions last night, and they were straight-forward (USS turned up within minutes).

But I have in the past been circling a planet for ages and nothing appears. It's as if some trigger has been missed. If re-logging doesn't resolve it, I head off to do other missions and try again later (where more often than not, it drops immediately).
 

Ophion

Ophion
On a side note, if you want to go back to nav beacon and you're to far away, it's easier and muck quicker to jump to nearest system and then jump back.
 

verminstar

Banned
verminstar
As already mentioned, ye can’t ignore the redirect and expect to complete the mission...and if anything untoward happens, either jumping out and in again sorts it.

Also, I’m assuming yer using an advanced discover scanner, as anything less might not actually reveal the whole system? Just a thought, been a long time since I used anything else so it’s just a thought.

If pirates show up, so long as ye got nothing in cargo and aren’t wanted, ye could just let them scan ye...they leave when there’s nothing to steal. Also the npc don’t ram the boxes, usually I do if I’m trying to collect them in a panic half way through and rats turn up demanding I drop the mission cargo. Far as I’m aware, the npc rats ignore the cargo right in front of them...weird. I figure this is their answer to not just stacking loads of them at once cos it’s a lot harder if ye have cargo ye don’t wanna drop making stacking multiple missions somewhat tricky.

Easy fix...use limpets unless yer really really good at picking them up manually ^
 

Imgran

I
mbar said:
You accept the redirect. Jump to the next closest system and jump back to the mission system to scan the beacon to avoid the long SC back. Assuming you have the fuel.

The FDL is a PITA to scoop cargo.
Click to expand...

For the love of god, why would you ever take a black box mission without loading some collector limpets? HUGE quality of life improvement for salvage missions. Since I started the game as a miner, I can't imagine not having limpets equipped to collect loose items.

With limpets, you can scoop and dash before the pirates even jump in, or secure the cargo to prevent them messing with it while you obliterate them. Flee more quickly or fight without mishap, either way, bring collector limpets on black box mission.

No sane person with mining experience should ever be taking salvage missions without collector limpets, and that includes black box salvage.
 
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mbar

mbar
Hmmm. I tried limpets in an anaconda once for black box missions. I found it faster to scoop the cargo myself.
 

Aashenfox

Aashenfox
Black box mission technique (and yes, it's mildly silly):

BEFORE accepting the mission, empty your cargo hold. DO NOT take a black box mission if you have something in the hold, except limpets.

Now, do what you did before. Only this time immediately decline any mission update offers. When you arrive at the body and the mission USS pops, jump in. At this point, it is possible (in my experience about a 1 in 4 chance) that a wing of 4 surprisingly well armed pirates will drop in and scan you. This is why you have nothing in your hold and why you waited to pick up the first box. They then leave, and you can scoop at your leisure.

It is possible to limpet them, while taking a few shots, then leave, but easier to wait. If you have a god ship, fight them, but yeh, as you noticed they do have a habit of not caring about the debris field or the canisters.
 
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